Recognizing the Fundamental Right to be Fat: A Weight-Inclusive Approach to Size Acceptance and Healing From Sizeism

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Taylor & Francis (Routledge) via the DOI in this record.Sizeism permeates and shapes how scientific and professional communities—including therapists—perceive, understand, and behave toward anyone considered fat. In this article, we use scientific evidence to argue for the recognition and establishment of fat acceptance to subvert sizeism. We first critically review the Weight Normative Approach, which dominates scientific discourse on weight, despite being based on sizeist assumptions that are discredited by data. We then articulate the tenets of the Weight Inclusive Approach, which honors size diversity and the promotion of wellness within a social justice framework. We end with strategies for therapists to align their practice with the Weight Inclusive Approach

Health, not weight loss, focused programmes versus conventional weight loss programmes for cardiovascular risk factors:A systematic review and meta-analysis

© 2019 The Authors. Published by BMC. This is an open access article available under a Creative Commons licence. The published version can be accessed at the following link on the publisher’s website:Background: Obesity is a cardiovascular disease risk factor. Conventional weight loss (CWL) programmes focus on weight loss, however 'health, not weight loss, focused' (HNWL) programmes concentrate on improved health and well-being, irrespective of weight loss. What are the differences in CVD risk outcomes between these programmes? Aim: To conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis to compare the effects of HNWL with CWL programmes on cardiovascular disease risk factors. Methods: We searched CENTRAL, MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsycINFO, CINAHL, ASSIA, clinical trial registers, commercial websites and reference lists for randomised controlled trials comparing the two programmes (initially searched up to August 2015 and searched updated to 5 April 2019). We used the Mantel-Haneszel fixed-effect model to pool results. Sub-group and sensitivity analyses that accounted for variations in length of follow-up, enhanced programmes and risk of bias dealt with heterogeneity. Results: Eight randomised controlled trials of 20,242 potential studies were included. Improvements in total cholesterol-HDL ratio (mean difference-0.21 mmol/L, 95% confidence interval [-3.91, 3.50]) and weight loss (-0.28 kg [-2.00, 1.44]) favoured HNWL compared to CWL programmes in the long term (53-104 week follow-up), whereas improvements in systolic (-1.14 mmHg, [-5.84, 3.56]) and diastolic (-0.15 mmHg, [-3.64, 3.34]) blood pressure favoured CWL programmes. These differences did not reach statistical significance. Statistically significant improvements in body satisfaction (-4.30 [-8.32,-0.28]) and restrained eating behaviour (-4.30 [-6.77,-1.83]) favoured HNWL over CWL programmes. Conclusions: We found no long-term significant differences in improved CVD risk factors; however, body satisfaction and restrained eating behaviour improved more with HNWL compared to CWL programmes. Yet firm conclusions cannot be drawn from small studies with high losses to follow-up and data sometimes arising from a single small study.Published versio

Peer Culture and Body Image Concern Among Australian Adolescent Girls: A Hierarchical Linear Modelling Analysis

Peers may influence the body image concerns and disordered eating behaviours of adolescent girls through the creation of appearance cultures within friendship cliques. The present study investigates the role of friendship cliques and school gender composition in impacting upon adolescent girls’ body image concern and disordered eating behaviours, using hierarchical linear modelling (HLM), a statistical procedure employed in the analysis of nested data. A sample of 156 girls was drawn from four private schools located in the capital city of Western Australia (one single-sex school and three mixed-sex schools). Eighty students from the single-sex school and 76 female students from the mixed-sex schools, comprising 35 friendship cliques, completed questionnaires assessing body image, disordered eating, and a range of variables that have previously been associated with body image concern and disordered eating, including appearance-based social comparison, frequency of appearance-based conversation, appearance-based criticism, friends’ concern with thinness, media influence and media pressure. Hierarchical linear modelling analyses found that friendship cliques in all-girls schools exhibited similar levels of body image concern and dieting behaviours, with various peer and other media influence variables accounting for these similarities. Friendship cliques in mixed-sex schools were not found to be similar with regard to body image concern or disordered eating. These findings support the notion that friendship groups can be an important source of influence on the body image concerns of adolescent girls in single-sex schools, and show that both individual and friendship clique level measures of attitudes and behaviours make independent contributions to the prediction of these body image concerns

FOXO4 regulates metastasis by binding to and suppressing RUNX2 transactivation ability.

<p><b>A.</b> Promoter regions of <i>RUNX2, PIP, PGC, PLA2G16</i> and <i>CAMK2N1</i> showing potential FOXO (DBE) and RUNX2 (RBS) binding sites relative to first exons. <b>B.</b> Matrigel invasion assay of LNCaP cells expressing control, FOXO4 or FOXO4 plus RUNX2 shRNAs. Error bars, S.E. of triplicate experiments. **, P<0.02. <b>C.</b> Relative RUNX2 RNA levels, as assessed by qRT-PCR in control shRNA vs. shFOXO4 LNCaP cells, primary tumors or LN metastases. RNA levels in each control condition were set to 1. Error bars, S.E. of triplicate experiments. n.s., not significant. Lysates of HEK293T cells transfected with HA-RUNX2 and Myc-FOXO4 were either analyzed by IB for HA, Myc or GAPDH, or immunoprecipitated with anti-myc and blotted with anti-HA (<b>D</b>), or immunoprecipitated with anti-HA and blotted with anti-Myc (<b>E</b>). <b>F.</b> Chromatin from LNCaP[vector] (control) or LNCaP[shFOXO4] cells were immunoprecipitated with control IgG or RUNX2 Ab, and the precipitated DNA subjected to qPCR using PIP promoter primers (<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0101411#pone.0101411.s007" target="_blank">Table S2</a>). Error bars, S.E. of triplicates. **, P<0.01. <b>G.</b> Chromatin from HEK293T cells transfected with expression plasmids for RUNX2, RUNX2+FOXO4 or empty vector were immunoprecipitated with control IgG or HA Ab, then analyzed for PIP DNA by qPCR as in <b>F</b>.</p

Microspectrophotometric evidence for cone monochromacy in sharks

Sharks are apex predators, and their evolutionary success is in part due to an impressive array of sensory systems, including vision. The eyes of sharks are well developed and function over a wide range of light levels. However, whilst close relatives of the sharks—the rays and chimaeras—are known to have the potential for colour vision, an evolutionary trait thought to provide distinct survival advantages, evidence for colour vision in sharks remains equivocal. Using single-receptor microspectrophotometry, we measured the absorbance spectra of visual pigments located in the retinal photoreceptors of 17 species of shark. We show that, while the spectral tuning of the rod (wavelength of maximum absorbance, λmax 484–518 nm)and cone (λmax 532–561 nm) visual pigments varies between species, each shark has only a single longwavelength-sensitive cone type. This suggests that sharks may be cone monochromats and, therefore, potentially colour blind. Whilst cone monochromacy on land is rare, it may be a common strategy in the marine environment: many aquatic mammals (whales, dolphins and seals) also possess only a single, green-sensitive cone type. It appears that both sharks and marine mammals may have arrived at the same visual design by convergent evolution. The spectral tuning of the rod and cone pigments of sharks is also discussed in relation to their visual ecology